According to ArcelorMittal, the worst of the economic downturn is behind us.

While the steelmaker’s fourth-quarter earnings Wednesday weren’t anything to cheer about, the company’s outlook for future steel demand–considered a bellwether for the wider economy due to steel’s heavy use in industry–offers some hope that economic conditions are slowly improving.

The world’s largest steelmaker by sales and volume expects its shipments of steel to rise by 2% to 3% this year as global demand for the metal picks up by approximately 3%. European demand for steel should contract only 1% in the coming 12 months, compared to an 8.8% drop in 2012, the company said.

ArcelorMittal’s chief executive Lakshmi Mittal said:

“Although we expect the challenges to continue in 2013, largely due to the fragility of the European economy, we have recently seen some more positive indicators, which combined with the measures we have implemented to strengthen the business, are expected to support an improvement in the profitability of our steel business this year.”

Already this year, ArcelorMittal’s shipments of steel have started to rise, said Aditya Mittal, the steelmaker’s chief financial officer.

“We are seeing an improvement in terms of shipments in all markets compared to the fourth quarter, whether it is to the United States or Europe, or even Latin America. So clearly, the first quarter is looking stronger than the fourth quarter,” he said.

According to Mr. Mittal, further shutdowns at the steelmaker’s European operations are also unlikely.

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